


Agape

by Captain_Panda



Series: Cap'n Panda's Whumptober 2020-21 [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Canon Divergence - Post-Avengers (2012), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Romance, Friendship, Gen, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective James "Rhodey" Rhodes, Protective Steve Rogers, The Avengers Are Good Bros, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Underage Drinking, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:08:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26762584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Captain_Panda/pseuds/Captain_Panda
Summary: Being Tony Stark's rock isn't always easy, but James Rhodes never shied from a challenge.
Relationships: James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Series: Cap'n Panda's Whumptober 2020-21 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1953019
Comments: 12
Kudos: 117





	Agape

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, my dear friends! I have missed you.
> 
> I have not been idle behind-the-scenes, and I am extremely excited to announce that I will be--attempting--Whumptober! I've never done it before and am notoriously bad at keeping fic-related promises, but, to heck with it, why not have a little whumpy fun in this spookiest of months? <3
> 
> Life has been hard on this side of the screen, but I've remained hard at work on several side projects, including two long projects that I am *very* excited about! I currently have about 50k of unpublished material. So, while it's been a while for you, things haven't stopped and I have no intention of slowing any time soon. <3 Take heart! Just because life gives lemons, doesn't mean we can't make lemonade!
> 
> Cheers and good luck to anyone else participating!
> 
> Affectionately yours,  
> ~Cap'n Panda

1986

“Oh, hey, you’re here,” Tony Stark greeted cheerfully. “You’re—hey, no,” he whined, as Rhodey shut the dorm room door and leaned against the outside of it for moral support. “Rhodeyyy,” Tony whined. “Rhodey, lemme in.”

“You’re already in.” And _skunked_. God, damn, it. Rhodey did not have time for this shit.

Tony whined, rattling the handle before banging on the door with what sounded like an open palm. “Rhodey,” he repeated. “C’mon, man, I’m _good_ , I don’t deserve this.”

Goddamn sixteen-year-olds, Rhodey thought, grimacing before drawing in a deep breath and saying, “No, get out. Jump out the window. Scram.”

Tony kept pawing at the door, making the same sad kicked puppy noises. “ _Rhodey_ ,” he finally bawled, in a theatrical caterwaul guaranteed to draw attention. “ _Help me, Rhodey_.”

 _Oh my God_. Still holding the handle, Rhodey turned it firmly—Tony was resisting him, because of course he was, he was a dumb skunk-drunk—before pushing the door open equally firmly, shoving Tony back with it. 

Under optimal, sober circumstances, it would have been easy to push him back, because Tony was not only the youngest person on campus by a _wide_ margin, he was also the smallest. And prone to complaining loudly that his growth spurt got lost in the mail when he was thirteen but it was fine because _I still have the sultriest voice in town, right?_ At Rhodey’s retort that, _No one says sultry_ , he just made a kissy face until Rhodey shoved the door in his face and locked him out.

Come to think of it, it wasn’t unlike the predicament he found himself in now, Rhodey reflected grimly, looking around his trashed room—bed torn apart, books _everywhere_ , the little gremlin had even yanked his posters off the wall. 

“Rhodey!” Tony beamed, tackling him into the nearest wall with enough force to rattle the storage unit. Rhodey grimaced. _God save the King_. “Hey, man, I haven’t seen you in like twelve hours, how the fuck are you?”

Goddamn _sixteen-year-olds_ , Rhodey grumbled, gripping both hands in fists at his sides so he wouldn’t shake Tony before sending him away. This, _this_ was why he shouldn’t have indulged the biggest, saddest puppy eyes he’d ever seen with generosity, he scolded himself. The human disaster that was Tony Stark had approached him at orientation, said, _Hey, can I just, like, chill with you?_ before sitting beside him. _Rhetorical question. Made you look_. 

Prying Tony off himself, Rhodey beelined to the wide-open window—not like it was the middle of the night, in _October_ , when mosquitoes flocked to the warmer indoors—and ignored Tony’s disgruntled little acknowledgment: “Hey, I was doing an experiment. I wan’ed t’see if I could shout across campus, stard’up a real _word-of-mouth_ campaign, y’know, I could—”

“Quiet,” Rhodey ordered. Tony hugged him again, smooshing them both up against the window, pointedly ignoring the radiator digging into Rhodey’s legs.

“Aw, you’re a peach, honey—peach,” Tony said. “I love you so much, hey, if I light a bonfire, can we—”

“ _No_ ,” Rhodey said, directing him to sit on the bed.

“S’mores,” Tony finished, beaming up at him despite not even looking at him, gaze lingering on something on the ceiling. “Spider,” he announced, pointing at it. “Hey, Rhodey, kill it—”

Rhodey grumbled, “No,” and then, “Why are you skunked?”

“’Scuuuse you,” Tony uttered, redirecting his hand to poke Rhodey in the chest—trying to, anyway, hand flattening in confused non-verbal communication before patting him twice instead. “Hey, so, I had an idea, for s’mores, right?”

“ _No_ ,” Rhodey repeated.

Tony shook his head, saying briskly, “No, Rhodey, listen— _Bunsen burners_ , just—”

Rhodey pinched the bridge of his nose. “You _look_ fifteen. How did anyone—”

Tony made a very disgruntled noise, saying in a deliberately deeper version of his conversational tone, “I do _not_ , I look _exactly_ my age—thirty-seven, give or take—”

Rolling his eyes, Rhodey turned to address the spider apparently on the—yup, nine-foot ceilings, happiest of days. “Can’t do shit about that,” he decided, rounding on Tony. “You gotta _go_.”

Tony blinked up at him, big, wet Bambi eyes unbearably sincere. Then he scrunched up his nose and said, “No, I’m _staying_. I earned it. I am here.” He flopped back on Rhodey’s bed, clocking his head on the concrete and flinging a hand back to grasp at it. “ _Ow_. What do they make this from?” Sniffling, he shuffled around so he could curl on his side, still gripping the back of his head. “Help me, Rhodey. I’m suffering.”

“You’re lucky I don’t hose you,” Rhodey deadpanned. “I’m tempted. I’m—”

Tony snored obnoxiously loudly.

“I know you’re awake,” Rhodey grumbled, as Tony flipped him the bird, eyes determinedly shut, snoring at full volume. “I am going to dump you in the pool.”

“I just want _love_ , Rhodey,” Tony said, suddenly and almost normally, blinking big, wet Bambi eyes at him again. “I am bored of textbooks. I am _booored_ of hands-on learning. Why’s’it even _hands-on_ if we haven’t blasted something into the _sky?_ ”

Turning away from him to focus on reconstructing his room, Rhodey sighed as Tony said seriously, “I need a girl.”

“No, you need a glass of water and a strait jacket.”

“Your kinks, not mine,” Tony retorted.

“Tony,” Rhodey grumbled. “Knock it off.”

“What? Just because your old man libido—” Rhodey stuffed a pillow over his head. Not meanly. Tony grumbled under it, “College sucks ass.”

“Well, _good_ —at least one of us is getting some,” Rhodey said automatically, making Tony bubble with unexpected laughter. He was such a kid, Rhodey thought, simultaneously endeared and exasperated. Between his genuine people-skills and unintended side effects, he’d be a real killer in two years, Rhodey thought, releasing the pillow as Tony flung both arms around it and hugged it. He sighed dreamily against it. Rhodey returned to picking fifty-two card pickup.

“Am I moving too fast? I’m gonna graduate before you. I can fail a few courses, it’s not a hardship.”

“You really know how to stroke my ego,” Rhodey said dryly.

“No, I’m serious, I’m—pick one,” Tony urged, not merely moving the pillow aside but chucking it, successfully knocking the last remaining figurine off the shelf. “Ten points. Hey, what if—concept— _you_ fail a few courses? That’d really stroke my ego.”

“Your ego doesn’t need that,” Rhodey said, sitting on the opposite bed. “If anything, it needs—”

“Concept,” Tony interrupted, holding up a hand self-importantly. Rhodey patiently waited three seconds. “Made you look,” Tony beamed, dropping his arm and whining, “Rhodey, I’m _bored_.”

“Go to sleep.”

“No. You’re not.”

“I was _going_ to,” Rhodey grumbled.

“Liar.”

“Quiet time. This is quiet time.”

“Hey, Rhodey, what’s your favorite _star_? I really like R136a1.”

Rhodey rolled his eyes heavenward. “Rhodey?” Tony prompted, flopping onto his own back like a particularly uncoordinated seal, clocking his head on the wall again and yelping, “ _Ow_. Fuck. What do you _dream_ about? I dream about exo-xo-xoplan’ts. Hey, first try.” He rolled over to say something else, nearly pitched off the bed, spared by grabbing onto Rhodey like a clingy koala. “Hey, so, you won’t believe this,” he giggled. “I’m _falling_.”

Planting a hand in messed-up curls, Rhodey sighed, “Yeah. You are.”

Squeezing him around the waist, Tony asked, “Little help? Huh?” Rhodey attempted to push him onto the bed, but Tony just hung on, insisting, “No, hey, c’mon, what’d I do t’ _you_?”

“Existed,” Rhodey deadpanned.

Tony clung to him with the same tenacity as before, despite his affronted slur of a voice—“No, ‘ey, c’mon, ‘s a low-blow,” and gleefully throwing his arms around Rhodey’s shoulders instead when he leaned down to pry him off. “I will be loved,” he said buoyantly.

Rhodey sighed, shoved him onto the bed—Tony rolled into a wall for a third and final time, whining loudly in disagreement as he curled around his head—and said firmly, “Maybe tomorrow. Go to sleep or so help me—”

Tony whined what may have been words or inaudible pleas—at least one was, _Help meeee_ —but Rhodey simply set about rearranging the room, sitting on the edge of his own bed near an actually quietly-sleeping Tony when he was done. Some people had no respect for personal space, he thought.

Maybe he could persuade his absentee roommate to move out for good. Since Tony Stark was such a goddamn permanent fixture in his living space, anyway.

. o .

1996

“Tony,” Rhodey said.

“Hm? Yeah? Something important?” Hooking an arm around Rhodey’s shoulders, Tony steered him away from the bar and said briskly, “Gotta talk faster than that, sweetheart, never get anywhere in this world if you slow down when you should be speedin’ _up_.”

“I think you’ve had enough,” Rhodey said, plucking the drink from his hands and ignoring the suddenly malevolent look Tony cast him. Tony’s anger was still considerable and surprisingly menacingly, despite twenty-odd years of seeing him in everything from ecstatic joy to snot-nosed sadness. “You know, it’s a more enveloping Christmas party if you’re—”

“Some of us, Rhodes, require no sobriety to be the life of the party,” Tony dismissed. “ _Enveloping_. Like anyone remembers 1996!” he bellowed at the rest of the room, which looked over in varying states of openly gawking to politely ignoring. Rhodey surreptitiously maneuvered them towards a hallway, out of sight. “It’s all about the _millennium_ , platypus, get with the _program_. Y2K is days away, to hear ‘em talk.”

“It’s four years away,” Rhodey corrected. “You okay?” His eyes were unusually bloodshot—for a guy who held his liquor badly under the best of times, he seemed more agitated than usual.

“Oh, what, I can’t _let loose_? Be _happy_? Tryin’ to—” He abruptly retracted his arm, even gave Rhodey a little shove, said, “Huh? What do you want? What do you want from me?”

 _Something’s wrong_ , Rhodey thought. Tony wasn’t happily buzzed—and Tony wasn’t sixteen and illegal, anymore, he was well into his twenties, he knew how to handle a few glasses without wrecking his own party, and he could go a little further and not look so _wild_. He looked like he was ready to tear into the first thing that moved. He was _shaking_ with it.

“I think we should call the party off,” Rhodey said firmly. _We_ , solidarity. Pointing fingers tended to put Tony’s hackles up— _you need to quit it, you need to stop that_ —and he wasn’t in the mood for a fight. “Okay?”

Tony glared at him witheringly, and for a moment, Rhodey truly thought the fight was coming. Then Tony turned and shouted into the hall, “Everyone, get outta my _home_ ” and with the awkwardness of VIP guests suddenly evicted from a very exclusive party, the masses exodused.

“There, now, stop looking at me like I shot your dog,” Tony said, snipped, unsteadily lurching back into the now empty room for another drink. “Honestly, can’t a guy—” He pawed his way to the bar, grabbed the first drink he found, and, hand shaking, held it up, “can’t I _just_ —”

Rhodey followed in his tracks, prizing the drink free and setting it down, an uncomfortable distance away. Tony stared at him. Rhodey held his gaze. Then Tony managed, “Jarvis is sick,” in such a deadpan tone that Rhodey almost missed it, like, _It might rain tonight_. An unimportant little detail presented in a way to be forgotten—but as Tony tapped the counter, accepted what hopefully _was_ a glass of water, his eyes misted dangerously. “He, um. We’re.” He drank too fast, coughed, coughed until his eyes were leaking, and set the drink down. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Is he gonna be okay?” Rhodey asked.

Tony hunched over the counter like he’d been shot. He reached for the glass, knocked it over. A helpless laugh bubbled out of him—it wasn’t even slightly funny. He buried a hand in his hair, messing it up.

“Yeah, yeah. He’s gonna be great. He’s—less than five years,” he said, blunt as a dull axe, still too heavy, still too deep. “Two, really, but—five, actually, that’s the—the—the— _prog-no-sis_.” He moaned in pain. “My head’s spinnin’ so much. Why’d you crush my buzz, ‘uh? You gotta do that to me? Can’t let me, let me do bad things?”

Rhodey eased closer. Tony planted a hand on his chest, firmly, keeping him at bay. “He’s gonna live to be a hundred-and-seventy,” Tony said, quick, almost but not quite clean. “’Cause that’s what I said when I was five. Edwin Jarvis is gonna live to be a hundred-and-seventy.”

. o .

2006

“Hey, if I—walked off the face of the Earth, would—d’you think anyone’d miss me?”

Rhodey, who had . . . had a long, long eighteen-month tour, serving his country, _doing what was right_ , and kind of just wanted to lose himself in a bottle, regretted deeply what a goddamn lightweight Tony Stark was. “I leave again in six weeks, you know,” he said softly.

“Yeah, but.” Tony was busy sulking in his own head. “Yeah—wait, what?” he said abruptly, looking at Rhodey and adding seriously, “You’re leaving?” Sounding almost panicked, he said, “No, hey, you can’t—that’s not an option, that’s not square, we’re—we’re a _team_ here, Rhodey, I just got you—” He stared at Rhodey with aching disbelief, like it was the day after Jarvis was told his cancer had metastasized in his lungs, and he had maybe a year left. “Rhodey—don’t—don’t do this to me.”

“I’m not doing this _to_ you,” Rhodey said, his tongue a little looser as he added, “You gotta shape up, Tony. You can’t kill yourself while I’m away.” _If anybody’s got a chance of dying, it should be me_ , Rhodey thought grimly. _Doing what’s right._ He did not voice it. It would make Tony cry, and he couldn’t deal with Tony’s tears, any more than he could deal with the very choked-up phone call about the fact that, at twenty-one, life _was_ moving too fast, and maybe his parents had died because he couldn’t slow down.

The quiet, maudlin atmosphere around Tony dissolved, and he said with sudden stiffness, “I am _not_ ,” before emptying half the bottle, gulping hard when he was finished. “I don’t have a gun in my drawer. Just my closet,” he deadpanned. “You know, my toys, they’re—I’m good at—”

“Yeah,” Rhodey agreed, cutting him off so he wouldn’t spiral into, _Am I a killer?_ territory. For someone who profited so handsomely on the mechanics of war, Tony Stark was one of the most conflicted combatants he had ever seen. It was only when he _was_ truly skunked, beyond caring about the intricate game of blame, that he seemed at peace with it.

 _I’m a killer_ , Rhodey didn’t tell him. _I shoot people. They die. Do you know what that’s like?_

He hoped, for Tony’s sanity, that he never experienced it. It was wearing on him. And he’d _wanted_ to be part of the Army, to serve his country. In peacetime, it was supposed to be an easy way to see the world, make a difference. So far—he’d seen a lot of sand, and he’d seen enough blood to wash his nightmares in red.

Sitting on Rhodey’s couch, drinking expensive booze, Tony Stark observed with odd prescience, “You better not get hurt, or I will _fucking_ tear this house down to find you.”

“I stay with my team,” Rhodey assured, resting a hand on his knee, reassuring. Tony flinched from under it, retreated inward. Rhodey worried about him, more than he wanted to. He’d been an exasperating kid, but there was just—something _about_ Tony, the forever-young genius, that made him want to keep Tony far from the ticking time bomb of life, to lie that life _was_ good and that was it, that the bad experiences were behind locked doors. He’d seen stone-cold reality, blood-matter red and ashen gray. He knew Tony’s life wasn’t gilded, but he hoped Tony never encountered the raw, the visceral, like that.

. o .

2008

And then Tony came home with a car battery in his chest.

“Arc reactor,” Tony corrected, drinking dry, lemonade, because the doctors said he couldn’t get drunk, and the one time he’d tried had nearly killed him. He was too weak to drink, to get _lost_. His heart couldn’t take it, not on top of everything. There might come a day, he was told, when he could tolerate alcohol—not _copiously_ , of course, no one ever recommended once to Tony Stark that he drink like he was dying for it—but that day was not two weeks after returning from the sandy battlefield.

He was always shaking, even without the aid of liquor. And his eyes were dark and haunted as he looked at Rhodey and asked, “So, how was your—trip?”

Rhodey put a steadying hand on his shoulder, and Tony walked away, putting distance between them. He’d been the cuddliest kid, Rhodey thought, a flash memory of Tony curled up against him and snoring while he studied for his finals hitting him abruptly hard. There was a lump in his throat.

“They gave me two years, minimum, shore leave,” he said, and Tony blinked at him, and blinked at him, and then said:

“Oh, well. That’s definitely enough time to win a Nobel Prize in Physics.” He swallowed hard, swishing ice in his glass, gulping it down. “Don’t you think? I think so.” He ventured over and, almost coincidentally, sat next to Rhodey, huddling too close on the couch. “I could win it for _this_ ,” he whispered, suddenly, like a confession, gripping the—arc reactor, right through the shirt, and laughter bubbled out of him, but it was airless, not funny, helpless.

Rhodey leaned against him, not trying to hold him, as Tony bowed over his knees, put his head in both hands, and wept noisily.

. o .

2010

“I _won_ ,” Tony said, shredding his certificate with two big tears and preening, “I’m _a winner_.”

Rhodey, nursing a headache and still trying to plow through a report, just grimaced from his place on his hotel bed and said, “Not now, Tony.”

“I _won_ ,” Tony said, louder than before, flinging the shreds of his Nobel Prize certificate in the air. “I _won_. Do you—” He sat on the edge of Rhodey’s bed, ignoring his own hotel bed and asking conspiratorially, “Do you know _what for_?”

Rhodey was reaching for his earbuds, too damn tired to deal with this, tonight—he could hold Tony for hours tomorrow while he cried about it, but he _could not_ do it tonight, not even for one minute—when Tony finished solemnly, “A dead man’s work.”

He still gathered his earbuds but cast a meaningful look at Tony, who was staring listlessly at the big ripped shreds of paper on the floor. “I won,” he said, slowly and softly, _bearably_ , “for a—dead—man’s—work.” He blinked once, like it had just occurred to him, and gulped down a breath, one hand rising to press on his chest. “I—”

Rhodey didn’t let it build—hooking a hand in Tony’s suit, he hauled him down and close. Tony hiccupped against him, burrowing with unexpected ferocity against his side, almost hiding underneath him. The metal in his chest—the _medal_ in his chest, God, what a morbidity—hurt, where it jutted against Rhodey’s skin. He didn’t say anything about it, much as he wanted to. _He can’t do anything about it_.

Instead, he draped one arm around Tony’s back, resumed his lengthy read-through of his report, and ignored Tony’s shivers.

Their lives were fucked up—real fucked up, no small amount discombobulated—but at least, he thought, as Tony’s breathing transitioned to sleeping, they had each other.

He carefully reached over for the painkillers, downed a couple more, and finished reading his report. Then he shut out the light and carefully maneuvered away from Tony so the metal didn’t dig into him anymore. He slept. They both did. And he didn’t dream about Tony Stark being eaten alive by the palladium in his chest, or declared dead on the news.

. o .

2012

Standing in the balcony room of his namesake Tower, Tony regaled the newly-formed _Avengers_ with the tales of their own exploits. _Can you believe this? We flew to outer space. I did. Me. Anybody get that on film? I want a copy. For bragging purposes. Oh, you climbed Mount Everest? I ever tell you about the time I launched a NUKE into space?_

Rhodey asked him, no less than ten times, _Are you okay?_ Tony brushed him off every time, increasingly irate, drinking well past his _pass a sobriety test_ limit, and ended up sitting on a couch and asking somebody else to pee for him, at which point Rhodey finally swiped the bottle from him and shouldered him into the nearest bathroom.

“Hey, I want shawarma,” Tony declared, strutting out and looking a little too awake for two in the morning. “I already had some, but I’ve—I’ve decided I want more. Please.”

“No, it’s late,” Rhodey said.

Tony blinked big, wet, Bambi eyes at him. “I don’t see—what that has to do with it,” he hiccupped. “Uh, are they closed? Can’t we, like—deliver that shit? God, there needs to be a shawarma delivery service. I _will_ riot. I will make my own, I’m a—” Another hiccup, wetter. “Hey, I really hate space bugs. Just, puttin’ that out there. You see those things? They—they’re awful. I’ve decided. Where are my shoes,” he asked, looking anxiously down at his socked feet.

Rhodey steered him over to a little bench in the hallway, doubtless placed as a sort of _crisis-of-the-soul_ resting point. Tony blinked up at him, gripping his arms limply in return. “Hey, did I die? Am I dead? I think I died for a hot minute. Cap kissed me.”

“I did _not_ ,” came the unexpectedly young voice of America’s most iconic popsicle. “’f I’d known you were telling lies, I’d’ve—”

Sneering at him, Tony said, “What? Come sooner? To spread _more lies_? You can say it, you know. I refuse to believe there was no _kiss of life_ involved.” He pursed his lips. Rhodey barely needed to see the stranded grimace that crossed Cap’s face—a mix of revulsion and frustration, no doubt.

“Knock it off,” he told Cap, who took one look at him, saw something he could at least deal with, and nodded. “I don’t wanna hear it.”

“ _I_ do,” Tony huffed. “Best kiss of your life, am I right?”

Cap offered, “Do you need a hand?” He directed the remark at Rhodey, the hostility for Tony barely concealed.

Rhodey couldn’t tell if he absolutely hated the guy or respected his approach. He settled on neutrality—for now. “No, we’re good.”

“I will accept a second kiss,” Tony offered, to be a brat, and Rhodey did see stone-cold Rogers’ ears turn red before he about-faced and walked away. “Goodnight! I love you!”

“Tony,” Rhodey chided, as Tony shook his head after Cap and added, less generously:

“Next time? You lay on the wire!”

Rhodey caught the little pause, the way Cap’s entire back went tense, before he resumed his steady walk away, the door sliding shut behind him.

“C’mon,” he told Tony, urging him up. “You need water. _I_ need a drink.”

“Reverse that, and it’s a _deal_ ,” Tony beamed.

. o .

2014

After the whole _my house was blown up by terrorists_ ordeal, Tony Stark avoided sobriety like the plague. “Egh, no, my best work is done buzzed,” he muttered, when Rhodey asked him why he wanted shaky hands for handling sensitive machinery. “’Sides, J.A.R.V.I.S. is my hands, if mine are inoperable. They aren’t, by the way,” he added firmly, handling a screwdriver with more dexterity than Rhodey would’ve thought possible. “Besides, besides, besides,” he chanted, “I need it. I can’t work when I’m sad. This way, not sad.” He said it almost cheerfully, like he’d invented a really cool new soft drink that he couldn’t get enough of.

 _I wish you’d stop drinking_ , he didn’t say. Tony Stark drank. It was an ineradicable part of him. Trying to take it away without managing the sadness—that was a sure way to put a gun in a wide-eyed man’s hands. _Let him have this_.

“You ever worry you work too hard?” Rhodey asked instead, approaching from a different angle.

Tony paused, blinked twice at him, then shook his head and returned to the helmet. “No, c’mon. I work exactly the right amount. All the time.” He grinned a little, brief and unhappy. “Hey, it’s a living. What do you do for a living? Save lives? Protect the freedoms of this country? Inspire people? God, that sounds exhausting.”

It was. It really was. But it wasn’t an earnest question—none of it, not, _What do you do for a living?_ or _How do I really fix the broken pieces inside me?_

Rhodey didn’t know. All he said was, “I wish you could be happy, Tony.”

Tony chuckled humorlessly, still turning his screwdriver, endlessly working. “I don’t.” Again, firmly, he added, “I don’t.” He shrugged. “I just wanna be alive. I am alive. What about you?” he asked suddenly, swinging around, looking up at Rhodey with unexpected attention, never a guy to be pinned down. “How’re _you_ , honey bear?”

Rhodey looked down at him, smaller than ever in his chair, blinking up at him hopefully. Like—he wanted something. _You don’t want a hug. You don’t want a fix. I don’t even think you want a drink anymore_.

“I’ve been better,” he said, offering the only thing left, the truth, and Tony just grinned like it was the funniest thing he’d heard all month and said:

“God, me too.” Then he turned back to his helmet, offered, “You can stay, you know. If you want.”

Rhodey thought about it. “You seem busy,” he noted, honestly.

Tony nodded absentmindedly, neither happy or sad with the answer. “Right. I am. I’ll be seein’ you.”

Gently, Rhodey offered, “Call me whenever. Okay? I mean that.” _Even if you’re on a bridge. Even if you’re in the middle of the goddamn desert. Just. Don’t get lost._

Tony nodded again. “Of course.” He didn’t carry the same gravity. It was a nice sentiment to him.

Rhodey pleaded, “I need that, Tony. I need you to call.”

Tony said again, still without looking at him: “I will. I _will_.”

Rhodey believed him. He left.

. o .

2016

“Cap and I aren’t speaking,” Tony introduced, his voice wet.

“Hell,” Rhodey said, stepping into the Compound and asking, “Why?”

“I—well.” Tony gave a very self-deprecating shrug. He swirled a glass of something amber and strong enough to make his eyes turn wet, too. “I—may have fucked up, a little. Just a little, just a—a—and then he fucked up. A _lot_.” He sneered like he would spit on concrete, but not the interior floor. “Do you even _know_ what a bastard he is?”

Well aware that Cap was a strong-willed man and Tony Stark was the strongest-willed man Rhodey had ever met, Rhodey firmed his jaw and asked, “What’d he do?”

“Oh, _well_ ,” Tony said, spilling his glass but holding onto his disdain as he added, “he thought it would be a _good idea_ to—to with—to hold information against me, about my, _my_ , my parents. Not his. Not theirs.” He swung the drink around, encompassing the entire Compound, wordlessly. He drank. He didn’t finish the glass, just stumbled, “Did you know, did you _know_ , this is just—a—thought, a—” He gulped, suddenly, and spun around like he would collapse into a chair that wasn’t there.

Rhodey stepped forward, but Tony just swayed away from him, shaking his head and uttering, “Did you _know_ they were _murdered_?”

Rhodey stared at him, shocked, cold. He’d heard how the Starks had died; the twist, that it wasn’t an accident, made his mouth dry out. He could only imagine Tony’s grief as he said wretchedly, “Did you _know_? Because _he_ did.” 

Tears dripped down his face. The only time Tony Stark ever cried was when he was drunk, and it was always painful to watch, like a butterfly with two broken wings, trying desperately to fly. There was simply no pain-free way to stop its misery; only a chance to watch as something struggled desperately to be against forces undauntable.

“I always _knew_ ,” Tony seethed, “I always—he’s wrong, you know? He’s just—he’s not _meant_ to be here and it _shows_.”

Rhodey had no opinion about it, beyond the obligatory: _It’s good to have you back, Cap_. Or maybe just _It’s good to know you’re not sleeping in ice_. It seemed like a very unpleasant fate, to linger forever between life and death. They’d done a good thing. And now . . . now Cap was the reason for the tears on Tony’s face.

Rhodey couldn’t help but hate him a little. “I just wanna go to sleep,” Tony said, with sudden supplication, like Rhodey would hear him out and let him find peace, “and not see monsters. Why is—why is that, _that_ so much to ask? And now I see _them_. I see _her_.” He sobbed, reaching up to scrub his eyes with his sleeve, spilling his drink on himself a little. Sloppy. Tony Stark wasn’t sloppy, he was put together and neat and pressed even when he was unkind, but this—this was Tony.

And he was bitter. And he was _sad_.

“I—I need to go lie down,” he husked, limping off, uncoordinated and shaking and somehow still clutching that damn glass. “I can’t talk—I can’t _think_ about it or my head’s gonna—explode.”

He fell onto the nearest couch, dropping the glass on the floor.

Rhodey—stepped outside, after covering him with a blanket, of course, because that was what he did, and made a phone call.

“Did you do it?” Rhodey asked.

“ _Do what?_ ” Captain America replied. And then, already answering his own question: “ _Yes. I told him. I’m sorry_.”

Rhodey hung up. He didn’t know why he needed to hear it, why it _was_ worse from the source.

Hours later, he called back. It was very late. Cap still answered promptly. “ _Cap speaking_.”

A bizarre way to answer the phone, Rhodey didn’t say. “It kills him, you know,” he said instead.

There was a prolonged pause. “ _I know_ ,” Cap said. “ _Is he okay?_ ”

Like he had a right to care. Rhodey said, “That’s up to him to say.”

He could almost hear Cap nodding in understanding. “ _You know_ ,” Cap said, careful, conversational, “ _I hesitated. I knew it was—but he had a right to know._ ”

“He said you fucked up,” Rhodey agreed, not sugar-coating it.

He half-waited for Cap to fling back at him, _Did he tell you that_ he _fucked up?_ He didn’t even know _how_ , but he trusted—for all his occasional lapses in judgment and audacious planning, he _trusted_ Tony—but Cap said nothing of the sort. All he said was, “ _I did. I waited. Two days._ ” A long beat. “ _I didn’t think it would matter. I didn’t—I was wrong_ ,” he admitted, surprisingly blunt. “ _And I’m sorry about that._ ”

“Don’t tell me,” Rhodey said. _Tell him_.

Cap nodded like he heard it. “ _He doesn’t want to see me. I—I’m still working on it. Making things right. Maybe . . . pass that along_.”

Rhodey owed him nothing. “Okay,” he said.

“ _Thank you_.” A beat. “ _How’re you?_ ”

Rhodey thought, _Tired of watching my best friend suffer_. He thought, _Tired of the nightmares, the blood, do you see blood? Do you have nightmares?_ He thought, _Hungry for a sense of peace, wherever it comes from, so long as it isn’t the bottom of a bottle_. Aloud, he just said, “I’m hanging in there.” And that was true.

“ _Aren’t we all?_ ” Cap offered, his conversational attempt unexpectedly thin, almost hoarse. Like he did have dreams of blood, like he did watch his friend suffer, like he did—hunger for peace, and couldn’t find it at the bottom of a bottle. “ _Take care of yourself, Colonel. And—him. I think he needs it_.”

 _He’s low and getting lower_ , Rhodey didn’t say. _He’s a guy that desperately needs a break_. He said, “You too, Cap.” And hung up again.

. o .

2018

Dr. Strange said they’d win, one in fourteen million odds—he said it like there was anything more than an infinitesimal chance that they’d _win_ , that they’d come out intact.

Instead, they lost two of their own, and Cap was the one who pulled him aside, numb and unable to bring himself to drink from a bottle, to say in a low, almost conspiratorial tone: “This doesn’t end here.”

Rhodey looked at him, simultaneously too exhausted to speak to another human being and more ready to throw all his chips into one hat than he’d ever been. There was still a fire burning in Cap’s eyes, a _will_ to win, like—like he wouldn’t accept _almost_ over _everyone_.

He wouldn’t accept it, Rhodey realized. So he wished Captain America, without real hope but a hell of a lot of need: “Godspeed.”

He’d survived seventy years on ice. He could save the universe. He _had_ to.

It was the only way they could win, Rhodey thought. Try, _try_ again.

In the end, it only took—four, heartbreaking, attempts to correct the universe. It was only fair, Rhodey thought, gazing at the platform, grimacing every time the Hulk counted down, _Three, two, one_ , before Cap reappeared, looked around, and grimaced like he’d hoped for something else. On the fourth try, he froze stiff, looked somewhere beyond Rhodey’s shoulder, and took off like a shot, faster than Rhodey thought it possible for a man to run.

“Jesus, that’s terrifying,” said the most welcome voice in the universe, as Cap halted in front of _Tony_ , only to sweep him into a hug and squeeze him until he wheezed, “Oh, God, I’m gonna regret this, I already regret this, no, let’s do over, let’s— _I’m kidding,_ uncle, uncle!”

Rhodey could only stare at them for a long moment, shocked beyond words, Hulk’s triumphant, “ _Yeah!_ ” lost somewhere in the backdrop. “We did it!”

Cap let go of Tony, who pressed both hands gently against his shoulders, looking past him and saying softly:

“Rhodey?”

Rhodey swallowed. He couldn’t move. Tony’s expression went from amused surprise to genuine softness as he jogged over, cuffed Rhodey on the shoulder and said, “You look like you’ve seen a— _uncle_ ,” he squeaked, as Rhodey squeezed him as tightly as he could. “Help! Help!” Rhodey just hugged him harder, eyes burning, refusing to cry in front of Hulk and Cap but—oh, hell, who _cared_ , Tony Stark was _alive_ and all was right in his world.

Then Hulk was tripping over his platform, noisily knocking things over, breaking them, roaring, “ _Nat!!!_ ” and Rhodey just held onto Tony, eyes squeezed shut as Natasha said somewhere nearby:

“You seemed like you were having a moment.”

“Oh, my God!” Hulk said. “You’re alive!”

He could almost hear the conversation that took place between Cap and Nat before Cap said, “I included the important details.”

“Right,” Natasha said. Then: “Right.”

Tony huffed a wet laugh against Rhodey’s shoulder. “I have a migraine, can I drink off a migraine? Oh, God. Overlapping memories. Someone hit me on the head.”

“Might need it,” Natasha chastised, briefly near, and Rhodey forced himself to let go of Tony so he could hug _her_. “Hey, Shellhead.”

“Hey, Widow,” he replied. “Boys’ club just got cooler.”

She said dryly, “I’m thinking of starting a girls’ club, actually. No boys allowed.”

Tony made a sad noise, then repeated, “Oh my _God_ , I have a migraine,” as he burrowed back into Rhodey’s arms. “Hey, did they have my funeral already? I wanna speak at the eulogy, that would be—”

“ _Tony_ ,” Cap criticized, a hand on his back, and Tony didn’t flinch, just chuckled and repeated a third time:

“Oh, _God_ , I have a migraine. And I think I died. Twice? Did I die? Of course I did, there’s a funeral.”

Rhodey just held him. And basked.

. o .

Sometime, around four in the morning, swinging together on Happy Hogan’s porch, Rhodey said out loud, “He volunteered.”

“I know,” Tony said, eyes closed, basking in the moonlight. “He told me.”

“How much did he—”

“Enough,” Tony assured, sparing him.

“You two had a falling out,” Rhodey mused. “And yet, the minute this all—he signed up. Signed on.”

“He’s disgustingly noble like that,” Tony agreed. “Team leader crap.”

“No,” Rhodey said. Tony smiled a little, like he already knew it wasn’t so. He nodded pleasantly. _It’s nice to be loved_ , he didn’t say, preening, nudging his foot on top of Rhodey’s thigh, taking up two-thirds of the swing real estate.

“What I wanna know,” Tony said, soft, curious, “is how the hell he brought _Romanoff_ back.”

Rhodey pondered that. “You ask?”

“No,” Tony said. “I figured . . . well.” He looked around. “Mysterious ways,” he decided on. “I remember—dying. Twice.” He grimaced, then squinted at Rhodey. “Do _you_ remember?”

Rhodey reached back for that moment, tried to understand it, but it was a point of such pain he didn’t want to touch it. He remembered looking into Tony’s scarred, mortally wounded face, and said simply, “All I know is, I’m gonna have new nightmares.”

“ _Geez_ , you’re tellin’ me,” Tony huffed. Then he yawned suddenly and said, “We should go to bed.”

“You first,” Rhodey said.

Tony smiled. “You know,” he mused, “sometimes, I think, that it was a real missed opportunity, splitting up with Pepper. But, _God_ , that kid’s sweet. Mowgli. Can’t believe they named him after _The Jungle Book._ But I’m happy that Happy’s . . . joyful. And Pep, of course. I’m not bitter,” he shrugged.

“Do you want kids?” Rhodey asked, inspired. There was a memory tickling at the back of his head, and Tony voiced it:

“Know the weirdest thing?” He waited for Rhodey to look suitably curious before finishing softly, “I feel like I already _did_. Isn’t that weird? But, like—I’d _remember_ that, right?”

“Right,” Rhodey agreed. It made sense to him—as much as anything could, regarding time travel. “Do you—still, want kids?”

“He doesn’t,” Tony blurted, then, squinting one eye, added, “I didn’t say that.”

“How long?” Rhodey asked instead.

Tony made an ambivalent sound. “I mean, not _long_. You were in France,” he accused. “For a _month_.”

“Trouble?” Cap asked softly, appearing in the doorway with two-year-old Mo perched on one shoulder, wearing animal-printed footsies and fast asleep.

Tony made a punched sound. “I want kids,” he said suddenly.

Cap blinked, then flushed, even in the darkness. “This is Happy’s,” he reminded.

Tony clutched at his heart, insisting, “I _need_ one. Them. All of them.”

“Start with one,” Rhodey suggested, as Cap swayed with Mo a little, looking like he wanted to talk but didn’t want to interrupt anything. Standing up, freeing a space beside Tony, Rhodey offered, “Maybe twins.”

Carefully holding Mo with both hands, Cap blinked at him, eyes very slightly reflective in the moonlight, and said blankly, “Twins?”

“One for each of us!” Tony said, like it was the most brilliant idea he’d heard all day. Then he laughed at the look on Cap’s face, ignoring the shushing as Mo whimpered against his shoulder.

“ _Tony_ ,” Cap warned softly.

Rhodey put a hand on his opposing shoulder, looked him in the shiny, almost wolf-like eyes, and said sincerely, “Thank you.”

Cap set his jaw. It wasn’t a mean thing—it was, in a very real way, holding back stronger emotions. “Anytime,” he said seriously. “Get some sleep, Colonel. I think we can hold down the fort.”

“Can I hold the _baby_?” Tony cooed. “I’m extremely capable of—”

“Don’t stay up all night,” Rhodey warned him, reaching for the door and adding for good measure, “and stay out of the wine cellar.”

“I will never touch a beer _again_ if I can hold the baby,” Tony pleaded nonsensically. Didn’t matter that he still had a car battery in his chest and a lifestyle that almost guaranteed _some_ kind of analgesic.

Leaving them to it, Rhodey saw Natasha seated on a couch, reading a book, and mused, “What? You too?”

Arching both eyebrows, she said, “Oh, no, I’m very happy being an Aunt.” She patted the space beside her, adding, “You should get used to being an Uncle. It’s only a matter of time.”

Rhodey’s face did a strange mixture of grimacing and smiling. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.” He accepted the cold beer she handed him, adding, “You are my favorite member of the boys’ club.”

“Six years and counting,” she agreed.

“Eleven,” Rhodey corrected.

She narrowed her eyes at him briefly. “What year is it?”

“2023,” Rhodey said.

She sighed. “Goddammit, Rogers,” she added, standing and venturing outside, to coos of, _Look, I found a baby!_ and _No, he didn’t, it’s Happy’s_ , and _Explain. Now_.

They would someday call it the Gamora effect—the art of perfectly balancing the universe, a one-in-fourteen-million outcome that could only _happen_ on the backs of unhappier knowledge, of relentless determination to pitch the perfect idea at the perfect moment, of hindsight that could never be earned on the first attempt—but as he listened to the trio argue, loudly at first and then very quietly at another whimper from Mowgli, James Rhodes downed his beer, flipped to the beginning of _Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone_ , and settled in for a long, long night.

. o .

2026

Tony Stark had been sober for three years.

 _Look_ , he’d said, pouring out a symbolic can of beer into the grass, much to Cap’s disapproval and Rhodey’s tolerant amusement, _I’m turning over a new leaf here. A new_ life.

And it was so. Sure, he still indulged in the occasional celebratory champagne, still made it known that he _could_ drink anyone under the table, including those of Russian and excluding those of Asgardian blood. But he was sober, and he was _coping_.

Whenever Rhodey stopped by to see him, however down with the flu or up with a novel discovery he was, he was sober. And it was really beautiful, to see a Tony Stark with— _an arc reactor, honey bear, it’s not a car battery, be a damn cool car if it was, and I should really step on that, you always come up with the best ideas_ —nothing but clear-eyed indulgence, flighty and all over the place and at times more than even three people could handle, yet still the most loving guy Rhodey had ever known.

“I made you a suit,” he introduced, dragging Rhodey off to his workshop. “You are going to _love_ it.”

And Rhodey did.


End file.
